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The best thing that the West can do in the Middle East is mind its own business and stay out. It baffles me that so many people don't seem to realize that many of the problems that we have in the Middle East today are results of Western (especially American/British/French) meddling from the past.

agreed. we don't need that crap. We should be concentrating on the space program, infrastructure, and regenerative medicine

I suspect that we are headed into a spheres-of-influence world. Major powers will seek to create their own spheres of influence.

At the global level, any order (to the extent that there is any order) will likely be minimalist. Perhaps it would be a remnant of the present. Or something negotiated between competing powers.

I agree....the world power "partition" I see in the future is the US, a loose alliance between Russia and China (to contain US military adventurism/expansionism) and the wild card India.

The EU is too fragmented and hopelessly a de-facto US vassal, Brazil is back into nowhere land...great potential but no world power material...too many problems and lack of a cross-party strong sense of national purpose in the world (a good chunk of the Brazilian political and economic elite is just happy to live more or less in US servitude).

Africa is definitely the future focal point (opening of potentially huge new markets, resources and a geographical sphere of influence up for grabs) where these powers will vie for control.

I agree....the world power "partition" I see in the future is the US, a loose alliance between Russia and China (to contain US military adventurism/expansionism) and the wild card India.

The EU is too fragmented and hopelessly a de-facto US vassal, Brazil is back into nowhere land...great potential but no world power material...too many problems and lack of a cross-party strong sense of national purpose in the world (a good chunk of the Brazilian political and economic elite is just happy to live more or less in US servitude).

Africa is definitely the future focal point (opening of potentially huge new markets, resources and a geographical sphere of influence up for grabs) where these powers will vie for control.

Well Russia is making inroads in Egypt, Libya and Sudan right now. And I heard that China instigated the coup in Zimbabwe. Then there is also South Africa which is also a BRICS country.

Well Russia is making inroads in Egypt, Libya and Sudan right now. And I heard that China instigated the coup in Zimbabwe. Then there is also South Africa which is also a BRICS country.

The problem with Russia is whether Putin is putting a system in place (business interests, academia, think tanks, etc...) to preserve a national interest no matter who is in power ...he put Russia back in the map but it has to stay there even after he is gone...that is often the strongmen problem...when the power is too concentrated in the hands of a single person or a very small group of people loyal to the strongman rather than to a country geopolitical interest.

The US has clear geopolitical objectives and priorities no matter who is in power....similarly (or even worse) to what I said about Brazil, without a strong national interest "layer" firmly in place, you run the risk of the nation ending up again in the hands of oligarchs and their political puppets willing to pull their pants down and sell their mother dead body for a buck no matter where it come from or at what costs (for example, like during the Yeltsin era).

For example, Russia should not tolerate NATO military bases at their borders even after a left leaning president is elected long after Putin is gone.....

The Yeltsin free for all wild ride is still fresh in the mind of Russians to serve as antidote but a power structure (call it Deep State if you will) similar to the US, needs to be built because collective memory tend to fade quickly....

The best thing that the West can do in the Middle East is mind its own business and stay out. It baffles me that so many people don't seem to realize that many of the problems that we have in the Middle East today are results of Western (especially American/British/French) meddling from the past.

To do that, you'll need to quickly move away from the use of fossil fuels. To do that, you'd need to have national policies that direct away from such.

None of those three nations have any money, how are they forming an alliance countering the West? CCCP used to own much of the central Asia, now it's a dozen independent muslimstans. Russia today can do what CCCP failed in the past?

China can play a role there, but it's not clear how other than building the Belt and Road.

Now that is an excellent point. And it is what I believe the main focus of Iranian policy.

The Iranians are a Persian speaking nation bordered on the west by dozens of Arab speaking nations. And even worse (from a foreign policy perspective), Iran is a mostly Shia nation surrounded by mostly Sunni nations.

So Iranian foreign policy is to avoid being isolated by taking the attention off themselves and put it on others as the outsider. For example, do people think the Iranian government really cares about the Palestinians (Arabs) that much? Or is it more about making Israel the outsider in the Middle East and taking focus off Iran?

I donít think Iranians really care about Palestinians. In fact, the only reason Muslims care about them is because of the fact that most of them share their religion and they live in the Holy Land.

I agree....the world power "partition" I see in the future is the US, a loose alliance between Russia and China (to contain US military adventurism/expansionism) and the wild card India.

Russia and China have their own adventurism in place. They are not countering the US for any noble cause, but because they want a their own slice.

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The EU is too fragmented and hopelessly a de-facto US vassal, Brazil is back into nowhere land...great potential but no world power material...too many problems and lack of a cross-party strong sense of national purpose in the world (a good chunk of the Brazilian political and economic elite is just happy to live more or less in US servitude).

I donít see anything wrong with that. If youíre going to follow a country, why not follow the most successful one.

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Africa is definitely the future focal point (opening of potentially huge new markets, resources and a geographical sphere of influence up for grabs) where these powers will vie for control.

Africa still has a long way to go. One thing they do definitely have going for them is that they are experiencing the largest annual growth of any economy in the world.

None of those three nations have any money, how are they forming an alliance countering the West? CCCP used to own much of the central Asia, now it's a dozen independent muslimstans. Russia today can do what CCCP failed in the past?

China can play a role there, but it's not clear how other than building the Belt and Road.

Russia can succeed where CCCP failed because Russia isnít promoting atheism any long and can use its Muslim republics such as Chechnya and Tatarstan to make in roads into the Middle East. With its large Muslim population Russia has observer status in the Orginization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and Russia used a lot of Chechchens to help fight and police in Syria. Russia can also use many of these Muslims as diplomats to Islamic countries. This is where Russia has a much larger advantage compared to the US and Europe.

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